Sheer Grit: Taking on Central Europe’s Most Extreme Race!

Only an idiot would come up with such a race. And only a moron takes part in it. I went deep, found the bottom and went through it to hell.

A participant in the 1,000 Miles Adventure

You’ll carry your own equipment and get food anywhere you can (if you can). For 1,600 km, you only have to think about yourself and your basic needs. And focus on completing the race over unforgiving landscapes and extreme weather. Sounds tempting?

It was for Rudolf Mana (56) who has been working in the Coke Plant at LIBERTY Ostrava for 38 years. He’s done it three times! A father of three children with three grandchildren; cabbage is this favourite food. He also enjoys extreme racing that may seem to the average person, an impossible undertaking.

His mantra in life is: You can give it up tomorrow!

The SPOKE team caught up with Rudolf Mana who completed the 1,000 Miles Adventure, and learned more about his motivations to put himself through such a gruelling challenge, how he prepared for the 1,600km extreme race and what’s next for him.

Rudolf Mana: I don’t want to be in the headlines among those who quit.

Why did you decide to do the 1000 miles adventure? Are you into cycling? 

The last time I raced was shortly after my military service. After that I was practising music and I didn’t do much of sport. Suddenly, at fifty-three, I told myself I had to achieve something. My cousin does the race regularly, he’s done it about ten times. He kept bugging me to sign up and I kept telling him I wasn’t up to it. I was scared of it; it is a daunting experience. Every year there’s a documentary on TV about it, saying it’s the most extreme race in Central Europe, and it really is.  It wasn’t until after Christmas in 2020, when I met a bunch of friends in a pub, that I finally made a decision to do it.  

What was your goal for the race?

My goal is to complete the race so that in the documentary that will be on TV at Christmas again I won’t be listed among those who quit the race! I also don’t want to disappoint my family and friends who are cheering me on and keeping track of where I am currently during the race.

What were the worst moments of the race for you?

There are some really nasty spots on the course where you know you have to push the bike in front of you up a steep climb for two and a half to three hours. You can’t ride it. It’s like the northernmost part of the country, the Nord kap, where you have to drag the bike over boulders, fallen trees, either in the extreme heat or in the rain, when there’s mud all around you. Or there’s a similarly challenging section in Slovakia where my colleagues and I agreed that we’d never pushed the bike up such a steep hill before. It’s about a two-kilometre stretch where you’re pushing the bike up a huge incline. Often it’s not even a proper path, but you’re pushing through the terrain over various roots.

I have my own training program, in which I have to ride 3000 km from the 1st of January to the beginning of the race. I go to spinning classes. I did 100 hours of spinning this year and I’m also training to walk upstairs. I lost nine kilos before the race and another seven at the race.

Rudolf Mana

Have you ever regretted your decision during the race?

Every time I got to the finish line, I told myself that I never wanted to do this again in my life. I called my wife after the race and told her to kill me if I told her I wanted to do it again next year, to remind me of maybe Spišská Nová Ves or all the crazy sections I went through. And anyway, when you get there, it takes about five minutes and then you know you have to do it again next year. When I finished the race this year, I had tears in my eyes. I don’t know if it was because it was finally over or because it was already over. It’s a wonderful feeling of excitement when you forget the 98 percent of all the bad stuff and only the 2 percent of the good stuff stays in your head.

What is so beautiful about such an extreme race that makes you sign up again and again?

The beauty of it is you don’t know what’s around the next bend. The course is always a little bit different. It’s different when you’re racing from the west to the east or from the east to the west. You meet some amazing people along the way. They stop, they take pictures of you. You feel like some kind of celebrity. They’re waiting for you; they’ve got signs on their houses: “Mile racers here”. They’re like unofficial checkpoints. They’re either people who’ve done the race before or have friends who have done the race.  They’ll treat you, give you food. They have tents in their gardens where you can sleep when you arrive in the evening or take a shower. One even had a drying machine and they washed and dried my sleeping bag when it was totally wet after the rain. I happened to arrive at a pub and I wanted to pay by card, but they only took cash. So, I wanted to move on, but when the owner noticed I was doing the 1000 Miles Adventure, so he gave me a thousand crown bill and told me to send it to him when I get back home. Or I was in another pub and when I wanted to pay, they gave me my meal for free.

How hard is this race for a person who is not a racer but likes to ride a bike and occasionally hits the road on bike?

There’s a lot of discomfort. One day you’re riding in 40-degree heat, and another time you wake up in the morning and it’s just four degrees. The first time I did the race, it rained almost all the time. You’re up to your ankles in mud. There’s no reason to change your socks, because your shoes are still wet anyway, and if you’re lying under a shelter somewhere, they won’t dry until morning. You don’t have a shower unless you go to a guesthouse. You have to count on getting caught in the rain at night and getting your sleeping bag wet, or you could get hurt. A lot of people have ended up with broken Achilles tendon. Some people are limited by their vacation time, where they only have maybe ten days to do the race and they have to quit because they can’t make it.

How many times have you done the race?

Three times in total. Twice I went all the way westward and eastward up to the finish and so I can call myself a miler. That was this year and last year, and the first time I did the race was in 2021. I only made it halfway. But I probably appreciate it the most because I had an accident after 50 miles. I had a broken bike, but that was fixable, but my leg started hurting and I had to go to the hospital and they found out I had a torn muscle. The doctor told me that the race is finished for me that I needed three to four weeks of rest, otherwise I could lose the leg. But the chief doctor told me that he was watching the race and to keep going as far as it doesn’t hurt. Basically, I did 700 km on one leg. So I really appreciate the white shirt I received for that. I couldn’t walk, I could just pedal.

Did you encounter any troubles during the race this year?

It was probably the most painful race of the three I’ve done so far. Last year, I got an achilles tendonitis halfway through the race. I couldn’t walk, I could only pedal. This year I didn’t have any health issues, here and there some falls, scrapes, etc. But you have to take that into account. The main thing is that I completed the race in seventeen days.

How often do you ride your bike when you’re not training for a race?

Now that I’m riding the Miles, I’m on my bike almost all the time.  Nearly every day I ride some forty, fifty kilometres. I have a track that I ride after work when I’m tired. I ride because I enjoy it. 

Will you be doing the Miles next year?

Yes, I’m determined to do it again next year. Since I have done the race in both directions I would like to try the southern route next year.